Date: Saturday, 5 June 2021
Time: 9.30 a.m. – 11.30 a.m. (Registration start at 9.00 a.m)
Venue: ZOOM Application
Speaker: Ir. Dr. Oh Chai Lian, Faculty of Civil Engineering – UiTM

Synopsis

Tensegrity Structure in a form of struts and cables owns important characteristics such as lightweight, self-stressed, flexible and controllable. The design of tensegrity system is different from the traditional systems with continuous transmission of compression. In tensegrity system, the tensional network (i.e. cable) is assembled in order to support the “floated” (or discontinuous) compression (i.e. struts). Tensegrity structure maintains its shape through self-equilibrium and its ability to stand without any supports under gravitational load is proven. Although the study on tensegrity system only started since 1950’s, the development and extensiveness of the study has fruitfully contributed to new independent branches of studies. Tensegrities has gained enormous interests in architectural, civil engineering, space engineering, sculpture construction, biology and recently in the robotic and automation community.

In the first part of her talk, the speaker will give an overview on the tensegrity structure, in terms of the brief history, principles, design concepts and several important applications. Tensegrity mimicking biological systems namely bio tensegrity is one of the important applications. Principle of bio tensegrity has been well adapted to living organism structure even in micro level like cells. The speaker will share her research work on the shape change analysis of bio tensegrity models mimicking human spine, in the second part. Basic assumptions, computational strategies and the important findings from the research will also be presented.

The objective of the talk is also to give a better understanding for our young engineers and practicing engineers to get some insight on the above topic.

About Speaker

Dr. Oh Chai Lian received bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering and master’s degree in Civil & Structure from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia in 2003 and 2005, respectively. She obtained her Ph. D in Civil Engineering from Universiti Sains Malaysia in 2017. She has been a Civil and Structure engineer for four years and as a Lecturer with Universiti Teknologi MARA since 2008. Currently, she is Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Civil Engineering, UiTM Shah Alam and lecturing on Mechanics of Solids, Structural Analysis, and Integrated Design Project. She is also actively participated in Research Works, writings and reviewing Technical Papers and Books. Her research interests are Optimization, Tensegrity, Green Concrete and Reinforced Concrete beam. She is Professional Engineer (P. Eng.) registered with Board of Engineers, Malaysia (BEM) and Corporate Member (M.I.E.M.) of The Institution of Engineers, Malaysia (IEM).

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